Girls Recap: You’re From the Seventies, But I’m a Nineties Bitch

Can we all just agree to pretend that this episode never happened? Because, did it even happen? It didn’t seem to happen. It didn’t, after all, seem real in any way. And I wanted it to seem real. But it didn’t seem real. It started off real enough, and then it all went horribly, horribly wrong. It could have gone in such a good direction, what with Hannah finally getting a freelance writing job from Jazzhate.com—which, I guess, Buzzfeed? Vice? xoJane?— and being told to go outside her comfort zone to write something great. And Jazzhate pays $200 for an article? That is crazy money. So, the pay structure isn’t exactly real, but at least its relative unreality explains why Hannah would compromise her “weird nasal passages” by snorting massive amounts of coke in order to “make the magic happen.” Because, as anyone who has ever done coke or been around people on coke knows, it’s pure magic, like newly driven snow that tastes like aspirin going down the back of your throat, making you really thirsty. That kind of snow. That kind of magic.

So, after Hannah has determined that she will do a lot of drugs instead of embarking on a threesome (too complicated as she has enough trouble “focusing on one other person’s body”) the only issue is where to get the drugs. Which leads Hannah to do the one smart thing she does all episode—she goes to see Jessa. Unfortunately, this visit with Jessa and Shoshanna is all too brief because stupid fucking Marnie (more on her later, ugh) recommends that Hannah get coke from Laird, the junkie neighbor who lives downstairs from Hannah and always hangs out by the mailboxes. Thus, we only have a few brief shining moments with Jessa, in which we see her selling her clothes on the street, including a blouse that one of Tom Petty’s Heartbreakers complimented her on because of its well-cut sleeves. This seems realistic to me because I went to a Tom Petty concert once, as a favor to a friend, and all of the Heartbreakers and Tom Petty seemed like very nice guys who would compliment a lady’s blouse. Anyway, Shoshanna agrees with Marnie that Hannah should ask Laird because “all the junkies in my building totally hang out by the mailboxes.” And so Hannah is off to get some drugs and write an article that she claims will “expose all of my vulnerabilities to the entire Internet.” This is, without a doubt, exactly what the Internet needs more of these days.

Hannah visits Laird, who is apparently now clean, though perhaps addicted to pomegranate juice, and gets some drugs after a little bit of friendly/creepy neighbor bantering. We do learn Hannah’s WiFi handles are “MuffinsAreTasty” and “MadameOvaries” which, great, though I am still partial to my neighbors’ handles, which include “LoudWhale” and “DangBrooklynGurl” and “SunnyfromtheMob”. The last one scares me, but in the right ways.

One Comment

I’m a little confused because the basis of this critique is that this episode didn’t “seem real in any way” but then you go on to decide everything that happens in the episode as realistic or “real, I guess,” or “real enough.” What gives?